The Art of the Shakedown

Tariffs on friends, wars in new time zones, hunger as policy, and masked raids in the rain, the chaos presidency enters its baroque period.

Good morning! Donald Trump is once again abroad pretending to be an emperor on a trade mission, but this time the robes are slipping. His grand “reciprocal trade revolution”, the one that was supposed to restore American power, manufacturing, and masculine swagger, has instead collapsed into a series of vanishing handshake deals, extortionate phone calls, and empty podiums. The Politico headline said it plainly enough: Trump’s initial trade deals in Southeast Asia have gone MIA.

Three months after he bragged about “historic” trade agreements with Vietnam, Indonesia, and the Philippines, the White House has produced exactly zero text, zero tariffs rolled back, and zero progress beyond the press releases written in Comic Sans. The “agreements” appear to exist only on Truth Social, sandwiched between posts about his golf scores and his new ballroom.

Now he’s in Malaysia, trailed by a caravan of sycophants promising “positive atmospherics” and “forward-looking outcomes,” diplomatic code for we’re winging it again. Even Trump’s own negotiators admit the math doesn’t add up, the tariffs are higher than the concessions, the allies are poorer than when they started, and the entire thing makes about as much sense as a billion-dollar golden ballroom attached to the White House.

Trump has turned his famous “Art of the Deal” into a new art form altogether, the Art of the Shakedown. He spent Saturday punishing Canada for the crime of quoting Ronald Reagan. Ontario aired an ad featuring Reagan’s 1987 warning that tariffs lead to “fierce trade wars” and lost jobs. Trump, in a fit of pique, added a fresh 10% tariff on Canadian goods. Because nothing says “stable genius” like getting personally offended by a Republican ghost.

He also demanded that South Korea hand over $350 billion for “protection,” which has sparked mass protests in Seoul with placards reading “This is robbery, not negotiation.” Even the conservative dailies are calling it “the mafia bill.” It’s extortion in broad daylight: the world’s richest country sending invoices to its allies while bragging about “$21 trillion in tariffs.” One South Korean commentator summed it up perfectly: “Why is a nation that claims to be rich begging for cash?”

But the grift doesn’t end at the water’s edge. Back home, Trump’s Justice Department is melting down over depositions. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, the same man caught meddling in politically motivated prosecutions, is now insisting he’s too important to be questioned. He’s invoking “executive privilege,” “apex immunity,” and every other Latin-sounding phrase that basically translates to “I don’t want to answer for my crimes.” Blanche is what happens when Roy Cohn’s ghost interns for Pam Bondi.

While the DOJ hides behind a curtain, Trump’s USDA is doing something even darker: holding food hostage. More than forty million Americans on SNAP are days away from losing grocery benefits because the administration has decreed that a shutdown it created doesn’t count as an “emergency.” There’s roughly $6 billion sitting in contingency funds that Congress explicitly set aside for moments like this, but Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins says the money can’t be used, not for this kind of crisis, because Democrats are to blame.

So that’s where we are in late October: a president who can find $300 million in tariff revenue to bail out a smaller food program, WIC, but claims there’s no way to feed forty million hungry Americans. Rosa DeLauro called it “the most cruel and unlawful offense yet.” Trump called it “a beautiful negotiation strategy.” More like hostage-taking with a side of ketchup.

And if you think his cruelty stops at the border, think again. The Pentagon has quietly doubled the number of U.S. troops in Latin America, dispatching the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford and its strike group to “disrupt narcotics trafficking.” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth swears it’s not a war, just a “dramatic increase in combat power.” Comforting when the words “combat power” appear in the same sentence as “Caribbean.” The deployment, part of what’s being called Operation Midway Blitz, looks suspiciously like the start of an undeclared conflict, and perfectly timed to fill the news cycle with something, anything, that isn’t named Epstein.

When a president demolishes the East Wing, shuts down the government, starves the poor, picks fights with Canada, and sends aircraft carriers toward Venezuela all in the same month, he’s not simply multitasking, he’s burying something. Every time the spotlight drifts toward the Epstein files, another “emergency” conveniently detonates, another shiny headline to keep us staring at the circus instead of the ledger. Whatever’s in those files must be very prosecutable indeed.

Amid the madness, there’s something remarkable happening in Chicago. When masked federal agents descended on the quiet suburb of Mount Prospect last week, neighbors didn’t hide behind the blinds. They ran outside. They shouted, filmed, and followed the SUVs through the rain, honking horns and yelling “You don’t belong here!” until the agents finally slunk away. Within hours, that same defiance rippled across the city, from Little Village to Belmont Cragin, as local groups began distributing tens of thousands of orange whistles with one simple message printed on the flyers: Form a crowd. Stay loud.

On October 29, they’ll host Whistlemania, an event to pack 100,000 whistle kits for anyone who might need to blow the alarm when ICE shows up. It’s democracy reimagined as a neighborhood watch, a chorus of defiance in a city where even street vendors now need sanctuary.

One Chicago cyclist put it best after buying out a food cart so a vendor and her child could go home safely: “We can’t stop the raids, but we can stop people from getting hurt.” While Trump sends carrier groups to the Caribbean, Americans are rediscovering solidarity on bicycles.

It feels like the country’s on fire, because it is, but not everyone’s running away from the flames. In living rooms, street corners, and rain-soaked suburbs, people are blowing their whistles and filming the darkness. Makes me proud to be an American!

I’m on the road for a few days with spotty internet, one trusty travel mug, and a very patient dog. If you don’t hear from me right away, it’s not because the Epstein files finally got me, it’s because I’m somewhere between Wi-Fi signals and rest stops. Regular programming should return by Tuesday, although some minor surgery on my pointer finger may make typing a touch problematic.